A tree, sometimes 25° high, usually smaller, with slender red-brown branchlets pubescent or puberulous when they first appear, becoming glabrous in their second year, and armed with small curved stipular spines; often a shrub.
Distribution. Texas; creek banks and cañons, near Montell and Uvalde, Uvalde County, and rocky banks of Devil’s River, Valverde County (E. J. Palmer).
4. [Acacia Wrightii] Benth. Cat’s Claw.
Leaves 1′—2′ long, slightly pubescent, especially on the petiole and rachis, with 1—3 pairs of pinnæ, slender petioles 1⅓′ in length, and eglandular or glandular with small convex glands, and linear acute caducous stipules 1/16′ long; pinnæ short-stalked, with 2—5 pairs of obovate-oblong leaflets, obliquely rounded and often apiculate at apex, sessile or short-petiolulate, 2 or sometimes 3-nerved, glabrous, or rarely pubescent, reticulate-veined, rigid, bright green and rather paler on the lower surface than on the upper surface, ¼′—⅚′ long. Flowers light yellow, fragrant, appearing from the end of March to the end of May, on slender pubescent pedicels from the axils of minute caducous bracts, in narrow spikes 1½′ long, often interrupted below the middle, on slender fascicled pubescent or sometimes glabrous peduncles; calyx obscurely 5-lobed, pubescent on the outer surface, half as long as the spatulate petals slightly united at base, and ciliate on the margins; stamens ¼′ long; ovary long-stalked, covered with long pale hairs. Fruit fully grown early in the summer, deciduous in the autumn, slightly falcate, compressed, stipitate, oblique at base, rounded and short-pointed at apex, 2′—4′ long, 1′—1¼′ wide, with thick straight or irregularly contracted margins and thin papery walls conspicuously marked by narrow horizontal reticulate veins; seeds narrow-obovoid, compressed, ¼′ long, suspended transversely on a long slender funicle, light brown, marked by large oval depressions.
A tree, occasionally 25°—30° high, with a short trunk 10′—12′ in diameter, spreading branches forming a low wide or irregular head, and branchlets when they first appear somewhat striately angled, glabrous, pale yellow-brown or dark red-brown, turning pale gray in their second year, and armed with occasional stout recurved infrastipular chestnut-brown spines ¼′ long, compressed toward the broad base and sharp-pointed, or rarely unarmed. Bark of the trunk about ⅛′ thick, divided by shallow furrows into broad ridges separating on the surface into thin narrow scales. Wood very heavy, hard, close-grained, bright clear brown streaked with red and yellow, with thin clear yellow sapwood of 6 or 7 layers of annual growth; valued and largely used as fuel.
Distribution. Valley of the Guadalupe River in the neighborhood of New Braunfels, Comal County, Texas, to the Sierra Madre of Nuevo Leon; most abundant and of its largest size south of the Rio Grande on dry gravelly mesas and foothills.
5. [Acacia Greggii] A. Gray. Cat’s Claw. Una de Gato.
Leaves 1′—3′ long, pubescent or puberulous, with 1—3 pairs of pinnæ, a short slender petiole furnished near the middle with a minute oblong chestnut-brown gland, and linear caducous stipules 1/16′ long; pinnæ short-stalked, with 4—5 pairs of obovate oblique leaflets rounded or truncate at apex and unequally contracted at base into a short petiolule, thick and rigid, 2—3-nerved, inconspicuously reticulate-veined, hoary-pubescent, 1/16′—¼′ long. Flowers fragrant, bright creamy yellow, in dense oblong pubescent spikes, on a peduncle ½′—⅔′ long, and fascicled usually 2 or 3 together toward the end of the branches; calyx obscurely 5-lobed, puberulous on the outer surface, half as long as the petals slightly united at base and pale-tomentose on the margins; stamens ¼′ long; ovary long-stalked, covered with long pale hairs. Fruit fully grown at midsummer and hanging unopened on the branches until winter or the following spring, compressed, straight or slightly falcate, obliquely narrowed at base into a short stalk, acute or rounded at apex, more or less contracted between the seeds, 2′—4′ long, ½′—¾′ wide, curling and often contorted when fully ripe, the valves thin and membranaceous, thick-margined, light brown, conspicuously transversely reticulate-veined; seeds nearly orbicular, compressed, dark brown and lustrous, ¼′ in diameter, marked by small oval depressions.